The Queen v. Karl Mullen (9 page)

“And then,” said Harriet hopefully, “surely he’ll go to another solicitor.”

Like most women she was equal parts idealist and realist. The idealist told her that it was absolutely right for her husband to take on this unpopular task. The law, if it was to function properly, must be equally available to the popular and the unpopular. But realism was saying something quite different. Roger was over forty. He had got himself, by good luck, into a firm which suited him and which had seemed, so far, to approve of him. Very probably he would soon be offered a partnership.

If he upset them, there would be no partnership for him. He might have to go somewhere else, without prospects. He might even, perish the thought, become a local authority solicitor. Possibly she was prejudiced, but she had sat next to one at a dinner party and he had lectured her on rating law from the soup to the savoury.

Roger said, “You realise that none of this may happen. If he succeeds in his plea for diplomatic immunity the case will be slung out and that will be an end of it.”

“Speriamo,” said Harriet in her best Italian.

The News Editor of the
Sentinel
said to his deputy, “By the way, one of our men who’s just back from South Africa said that Mullen is quite a well-known character out there. He’s got a nickname. They call him the Pencil Man.”

“Meaning what?”

“Stoddart didn’t know. He thought perhaps it meant that Mullen was a back-room boy. The sort of policeman who sat in his office writing minutes instead of getting out on the street and doing his job.”

The deputy thought about it. He said, “If we could find out what it means – if it’s some sort of insult – we should be able to make something of it.”

“We could let our cartoonist have it. Might give him some new ideas. He’ll have to give up his grotesque cartoons of Maggie now.”

The list of names painted inside the doorway of No. 7 Dr. Johnson’s Buildings was headed by Leopold de Morgan. In accordance with convention, there was nothing to indicate the fact that he was a Queen’s Counsel and a Member of Parliament; or that he had held the office of Attorney General in the Socialist government.

Martin Bull had joined the Chambers sixteen years before and his name was now halfway down the list of twenty-two. At this moment he was in conference with Roger Sherman taking what he described as ‘a preliminary canter over the course’. He and Roger had been friends since the time, many years before, they had been members of the same bob-sleigh team in the run-up to the Winter Olympics.

“One thing’s clear,” said Bull, “You’ll have to bring Mullen along here. Also his boss. Who would that be?”

“It depends. Theoretically, the Ambassador. But, if he’s holding some sort of consular post it would be the Consul General. In fact, I doubt whether he comes under either of them. If he’s attached to anyone it’s either the Security Section, in Axe Lane, or a separate outfit in High Holborn—”

“Stop, stop,” said Bull, pushing his hand claw-wise through his hair. “Stop and start again. This is where I rely on you.”

“I thought you were the expert. I told Banting you knew all there was to be known about international law.”

“Then I hope you’re aware that you were talking out of the back of your neck.” He spoke with the familiarity to be expected between two men who had descended an ice-slope at seventy miles an hour on a fragile saddle of wood and steel, clasped together in a more than fraternal embrace. This was because they were alone. In conference, with strangers present, they behaved with a Victorian formality of language and deportment. “How much I know about international law is beside the point. What matters is the application of that law to these particular circumstances. So stop fluffing and let me have everything you’ve found out so far.”

“All right. Here goes. There’s the Embassy, on the east side of Trafalgar Square, maintained, I suspect, largely as a front, and there’s the Consulate in King Charles II Street. That’s a pretty busy place. It deals with members of the public. People who want passports or visas or to complain about their aunt having been insulted by the police in Johannesburg. Then you’ve got the technical outfit in High Holborn. Commercial Attaché. Scientific Officer and bods like that. They’ve all got their own in-house security men—”

“I don’t follow. If all these outfits have got their own security men, where does the other section fit in? The one you called the Security Section.”

“A good question,” said Roger. “And it’s something that puzzled me. It’s run by a man called Fischer Yule. It’s practically autonomous, and extremely secretive. I suppose the true description of Yule’s outfit would be counter-propaganda. Passive and active. There are one or two newspapers that are not entirely hostile. He can supply them with facts about the extent to which South Africa is being misunderstood. And they keep tags on known dissidents. People like Jack Katanga, who’s just produced this book.”

“
Death Underground.
Rather good stuff, I thought. I suppose it was ghosted.”

“I don’t think so. It’s his first book, but he’s been churning out articles for the press for years.”

Martin Bull thought about this for a minute in silence. Then he said, “Do you think it really was a coincidence that Katanga should have been the one to spot Mullen putting the book back?”

“Always bearing in mind that your instructions are that he never took it in the first place.”

“Certainly. And it’s a great pity. If he’d allow us to run the line that the whole thing was a set-up – that the book was planted on him and Katanga being where he was and this mysterious detective happening to be outside was all part of a skilful fix – I think we’d have a very good chance. Particularly since their vital witness is Katanga and he could hardly be described as unprejudiced. But if he insists on sticking to straight denial – ‘I never touched the bloody book and I defy you to prove it’ – then, if you want my honest opinion, I think he’ll go down.”

“Even without this additional tit-bit of the earlier conviction.”

“If they had that, he’d be sunk. Our only real hope would be to get the case thrown out under diplomatic immunity provisions.”

“And what are the chances of that?”

“I’ll give you an answer when I’ve seen Mullen and his superior officer. It won’t be a walk-over. Oh, I hear they’ve dumped poor little Totten and taken in Dudley Lashmar.”

“Never heard of him.”

“You will. He’s a young man on the way up.”

“I gather you don’t like him.”

“I don’t dislike him. He’s clever and hard-working, but not generally popular. I think it’s because he’s too fond of demonstrating how clever he is. He enjoys arguing unarguable propositions, like nothing exists until someone sees it, or how do you know that the world isn’t flat. And shouting down all your counter-arguments.”

“I see,” said Roger. “An undergraduate who hasn’t grown up. Whose Chambers does he fascinate with his sparkle?”

“He’s one of Sir Humphrey Belling’s boys. And what’s the joke?”

“It’s just occurred to me. If this case goes to the Court of Criminal Appeal, or even higher – which it might – we’d have the present Attorney General fighting a sham battle with one of his predecessors. Tweedledum and Tweedledee.”

“So far as Sir Humphrey’s concerned, it wouldn’t have been a sham battle, I assure you. He loathes de Morgan’s guts.”

“Because one’s a hide-bound Conservative and the other’s a dangerous Radical?”

“I don’t think politics comes into it. Or not a lot. More a personal matter. You may remember that the Attorney Generals under the Socialists all refused knighthoods. When Humphrey eventually got the job, under the Tories, Leopold wrote him a letter, with his tongue in his cheek, congratulating him on his eminence and saying he supposed that Humphrey would follow the excellent example of his Socialist predecessors. Upon which Humphrey wrote back, thanking him for the first part of his letter and pointedly ignoring the second. The truth is, he wanted that K badly.”

“Money down the drain,” said Hartshorn.

“Do you mean to say,” said Boyo Sesolo, “that he trailed behind this lawyer feller all the way up to the library, then sat outside, picking his nose, then follered him home again? What use did he think that was?”

“No use at all.”

They were in Sesolo’s flat, which was on the first floor of the Mornington Square house, facing the Communications Room and immediately above the Administration block which occupied the whole of the ground floor. This isolation of Boyo had been deliberate. He was an exuberant character, who often hosted parties of his old athletic friends, or of members of his student army; parties which were apt to continue, with musical honours, into the early hours of the morning.

“Why didn’t you use some of my boys? They’re stoodents. They’d have a card to get into any library. Or if they hadn’t, be sure they’d have found some way round it.”

To call Sesolo’s helpers ‘boys’ was misleading. They were students or ex-students, in their twenties or early thirties. A few of them were, no doubt, motivated by a genuine dislike of South African police brutality. But to most of them it was a game. A rough game, in which, since they were playing for the popular side, their violence was condoned, or even approved of. Descendants of the Mohocks and the Tityre-tu, they had substituted for the old aristocratic ruffianism a colder and more deliberate brutality. Most of them were tolerably well-off and none of them asked for money for their services. They were paid by the squeals and humiliation of their victims.

“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Hartshorn. “I don’t see much future in trailing round after that solicitor. Whatever he went up to Colindale to do, he’s done it. We had our chance and we fluffed it. And I don’t think he’ll give us another one. Because, normally, he’s a very wide-awake character.”

“You know him?”

“Not personally. But our paths, as you might say, crossed. He was a company commander in the Royal Warwicks when I was R.S.M. in the Buffs. We were brigaded together for training and I heard a good deal from my friends in the Sergeants’ Mess about Captain Sherman. He was quite a lad. Always ready for anything that was going. They were sorry to hear that he was handing in his chips at the end of camp. I remember thinking at the time, here was I, sweating my guts out to get a commission, which he was chucking away as though it was so much waste paper.”

“That’s life, isn’t it?” said Sesolo. “Reverting to what we were discussing, I’ve got two or three boys wouldn’t say ‘no’ to a little action.”

“Then there is something they could do. It wouldn’t be exciting, but it might pay dividends if they could keep an eye on Katanga. He’s got this little house – it’s called the Homestead – in a side road off Putney Park Lane, opposite the Convent. I don’t mean picket the place. There’s Putney Heath alongside, so they’ve plenty of chance to keep out of sight. What they’ve got to do is keep their eyes open. Remember, he’s the star witness for the prosecution. You can bet the defence will be going flat out to get any dirt they can on him.”

“Or if they can’t find any dirt, to manufacture some, eh?”

“I wouldn’t put it past them. Either way, it’s going to be useful for there to be a friend or two at hand. Their main job is observation. Make a note of anyone who visits him. Particularly lawyers or policemen. And, of course, if anyone tries to get rough with him, they could butt in.”

“They’d enjoy that,” said Sesolo. “They’re great butter-inners.”

Six men were crowded, rather uncomfortably, into Martin Bull’s room. There was Max Freustadt, the Consul General, with his Head of Chancery, Dieter Langenhoven. Fischer Yule had brought his legal man, Silverborn, with him. Roger and his client, Mullen, were squeezed together at the end of the table. The air was thick with tobacco smoke.

“I think that’s as far as we can go with the main charge,” said Bull. “We’ll be up before Lauderdale. His stomach makes him a bit irritable, but he’s a sound enough lawyer and he’ll listen to arguments. I intend to take the diplomatic privilege point before the case is allowed to go any further.”

“I entirely agree,” said Freustadt. “The less anyone hears about this deplorable business, the better for all concerned.”

His opinion of Mullen was clear from the look which accompanied this statement. Before the silence which it provoked could become uncomfortable, Bull continued smoothly, “I won’t trouble you with the purely legal points, though I’d be delighted to discuss them afterwards with Mr. Silverborn. Quite simply, what I shall seek to establish is that Mr. Mullen came here to take up a diplomatic post. The only fact which seems, at first sight, to tell against this is that he spends most of his time with your Security Section in Axe Lane.”

This statement, which seemed to have a question mark at the end of it, was directed equally to Yule and Mullen. It was Yule who fielded it. He said, with a slight smile, “The frequent visits which Mr. Mullen pays to No. 10 Axe Lane can be very easily explained. I have managed to accommodate him with a flat at the back of the building, pending the time when he can acquire more permanent accommodation.”

“Not easy to get digs in London, today,” agreed Bull. “Well, so much for that. What we have to keep our eyes on is Article 31 of the Schedule to the Diplomatic Privileges Act, 1964. That is the Article, as I expect you know, which gives diplomatic agents immunity from all criminal proceedings and exempts them from any obligation to give evidence.”

Everyone except Mullen nodded sagaciously as though they had known all about Article 31. Mullen contented himself with grunting.

“So, quite clearly, what we have to do is to establish that Mr. Mullen is a diplomatic agent. That is to say, a member of the Ambassador’s diplomatic staff. And the person who can give the best answer to that is the Ambassador.”

“I feel certain that His Excellency will be glad to give us whatever assistance he can,” said Freustadt. “We have informed him of the unfortunate – the most unfortunate – circumstances of the case. Mr. Langenhoven and I will draft a carefully written statement and we will obtain his signature to it.”